This paper begins with Psalm 68:31, “Princes shall come out of Egypt; Ethiopia shall soon stretch out her hands unto God.” Coined “the Ethiopian Prophecy,”[1] this biblical verse, is important because Garvey frequently referred to it, and Ethiopia, in his speeches throughout the 1920s. His now famous utterance, "Look to Africa, when a black king shall be crowned, for the day of deliverance is at hand," can be interpreted as a rendering, reinterpretation, or even fulfillment of that verse. With this statement, Ethiopianists in Jamaica interpreted the crowning of Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia as the fulfillment of a biblical prophecy. However, Psalm 68:31 is even more important for its long history of use among Anglophone Afrikans in the Diaspora, and it is one of the pillars of Ethiopianism.[2][3] This paper will trace the history of Ethiopianism, how it gave rise to proto-Rastafari movements, and how the latter incorporating Garveyism, ultimately gave birth to Rastafari.

Foundations of Ethiopianism

Hermeneutic scholars had long wrestled with the meaning of Psalm 68:31. To the Egyptian Church Father, Origen, the psalm meant Ethiopia was a synecdoche for Gentiles. To Augustine, another Afrikan descended Church Father, it suggested that and much more: Ethiopia was a remote land; Ethiopia would convert to Christianity; it was a prophecy of Christ’s universal salvation.[4] (Within Judaism, some rabbis interpreted the verse to mean Ethiopia will convert to Judaism.) However, in the end, Church Fathers and early theologians interpreted the verse to mean: Ethiopia was the converted sinner, who through faith will enter into God’s new order, via Christ.[5] In the early 1700s, since West Afrikans were not Christians, Christian thinkers concluded that Psalm 68:31 had not yet been fulfilled; hence, Ethiopians (Negroes) had to be Christianized. This led to missionary emigration,[6] in which Britain sought to proselytize Christianity to free and enslaved Ethiopians, in her colonies and Afrika.

Initially the idea of “giving slaves religion” was rejected by slave masters for two reasons: first, masters feared that stories like Moses leading the Israelites out of bondage might encourage behaviors that challenge enslavement, and second, that baptism would give the enslaved a claim to freedom. But once the latter fear proved unfounded,[7] as colonial legislatures passed laws stating a bondsman’s conversion did not alter his legal status, conversion proceeded rapidly. The first concern, masters believed they could resolve through Christianization. They perceived Christianization as a means of perpetuating slavery,[8] and a way to control the enslaved. This religious indoctrination was designed to keep them docile, servile, obedient, and content. These objectives could only be achieved with “slave” Bibles and teachings that supported the status quo. However, for the brutalized and dehumanized enslaved Afrikan, religion provided hope and cathartic escape. When the enslaved embraced Christianity, and especially evangelical Protestantism, their motivations were entirely different from their masters’ intentions. Afrikans established what was called the “invisible church” where worship was conducted out of the view of whites, usually deep in the woods late at night. This church allowed the enslaved to worship in a way that was meaningful to them. From these churches religious songs developed known as “spirituals” that expressed defiance toward slavery and a hope for freedom. Often these songs functioned even more explicitly as expressions of resistance, encoding messages about secret meetings or providing directions for escape. The songs spread as the enslaved were traded from plantation to plantation. It was also in the invisible church that the enslaved Afrikans instinctively identified their plight with the ancient Israelites. As Afrikans were exposed to stories from the Bible, they saw parallels to their own situation. For example, in the story of the exile of the Israelites and their captivity in Babylon, they saw a mirror of their own captivity. In the story of David and Goliath, it gave inspiration that the weak could beat the strong. And the story of Jesus as Messiah offered the enslaved hope for salvation, if not in this life, then in the next. This affinity to the ancient Israelites was natural, but in addition to this affinity, another one developed between themselves and the Ethiopians.

Ironically, this association was fostered by white society. In the Anglophone world, since Christian thinkers and writers, such as George Fox, Cotton Mathers, and the Judge Samuel Sewall had associated the blackness of Ethiopians with the phenotype of the enslaved, all Negroes became identified as Ethiopians. Therefore, we can assume that because European Christians had adopted the term Ethiopian as a racial designation, the enslaved naturally began to identify as such. Initially, the enslaved identified with their ethnic group, such as the Yoruba, Asante, Fon, Mandinka, BaKongo, etc. They saw themselves as a separate people, but the designation as Ethiopians created a sense of oneness. Not just in the condition of enslavement was there a commonality, but now as a race there was a basis for identity across ethnicities. Additionally, once the enslaved learned that both Egypt and Ethiopia were in Afrika, their land of origin, it further facilitated an Ethiopian identity.

The religious revival movement known as the Great Awakening led to the proliferation of the Baptist and Methodist denominations within Protestantism. It swept through Protestant Europe and the British colonies, especially her American colonies during the 1730s and 1740s. The Baptists and Methodists preached to whites and Blacks alike; among the latter, they converted and authorized congregations for free Blacks and the enslaved. This was especially true in the Baptist Church, where Afrikan Americans were welcomed as members and preachers. A Second Great Awakening, nearly sixty years later only accelerated this revivalist trend, and by the late 18th early 19th centuries, independent Afrikan American congregations numbered in the hundreds. In addition to offering salvation, these churches attracted Afrikans for another reason: the hope of freedom. From the beginning, unlike the Anglican and Catholic churches, the Baptist and Methodist churches opposed slavery and urged manumission, taking an active role in the anti-slavery movement. As a result, these evangelical Protestant churches inspired and increased the demand for freedom by the enslaved. Moreover, in some cases, in the Black church, rebellions were planned at revival meetings, such as the revolt by Gabriel Prosser in 1800.[9]

Established around 1758, the Afrikan Baptist or "Bluestone" Church was the first known Afrikan church in America. It was founded on the William Byrd plantation near the Bluestone River, in Mecklenburg, Virginia. One of the oldest Black churches (in terms of having its own physical structure) was the First African Baptist Church of Savannah, Georgia, which was established in 1777. Originally called the Ethiopian Baptist Church of Jesus Christ,[10] this church was associated with the pastoral life of George Liele, who later became the first American missionary. Richard Allen and Absalom Jones, in 1794, established the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME), the first independent Afrikan church. In 1816, Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, S.C.—affectionately known as "Mother Emanuel," was established and would become the church of Denmark Vesey, leader of the largest planned slave rebellion in American history. The church would be implicated in the plot and subsequently razed. Years later, the enslaved Baptist preacher Nat Turner, would plan his revolt at religious gatherings.

Were these various uprisings simply the Afrikan’s desired to be free, or was the fact that religious leaders led most of them of some significance? Earlier we looked at how early Christians interpreted Psalm 68:31; were these rebellions motivated by Afrikans’ interpretation of this Psalm? While slave narratives and the spirituals give some indication of possible interpretations of the Ethiopian Prophecy, in 1829, we get a clear declaration of how the Afrikan church in America was interpreting Psalm 68:31. An Afrikan American preacher named Robert Alexander Young writes The Ethiopian Manifesto,[11] arguing for universal freedom for Black people, and drawing parallels between the biblical Jews and the presently enslaved Afrikans/Ethiopians. Young identifies all Black people as Ethiopians, stating there is a connection among all Black women, men, and children because of Psalm 68:31. His pamphlet is a call to unity (proto-Pan Afrikanism[12]). He argues that Afrikan Americans, whether free or enslaved, were living in a land of wickedness and sin. As a result, God will deliver His children to a state of grace, that this deliverance is part of God’s plan. For Young, this deliverance would come through the work of a messiah. He felt history had demonstrated that God divinely appoints messengers, such as Noah, Moses, and Jesus, to act as a point of contact between the human and the divine with one primary purpose: to rescue God’s chosen people (Ethiopians) from a land doomed to destruction.

[2] Ethiopianism, which was derived from various biblical verses and passages, helped the enslaved Afrikans develop a new identity that gave them a sense of pride and worth by identifying first with an Afrikan people that were historically important, Ethiopians, and second it allowed them to identify with the sufferings of the ancient Israelites, and see themselves presently as God’s chosen people, whom He will assist in their quest for freedom.

[3] We must make a distinction between Ethiopianism and The Ethiopian Movement (TEM). The former grew from the experience of enslavement and we have therefore associated it as mainly or initially a Diasporan expression. It was the precursor to Pan Afrikanism and like it, both were exported to Afrika. On the other hand, TEM is mostly a continental phenomenon. Though both were fueled by religious inspiration, in fact, both drew inspiration from Psalm 68:31; but the former preceded and influenced the latter, and developed in response to enslavement and exposure to Christianity; whereas the latter was primarily a Pan Afrikan religious movement that developed during the Afrikan colonial period in southern Afrika. Thus, the emphasis of the former was on freedom from slavery, while the latter sought religious freedom and expression within Christianity. Regarding TEM, in 1888, an evangelist named Joseph Mathunye Kanyane Napothe broke away from the white controlled Anglican Church and formed the African Church. Later In 1892, a minister of the Wesleyan Methodist Church, Mangena Maake Mokone, broke away from that denomination and formed the Ethiopian Church. (One of the main reasons for breaking away was to give Afrikan spiritual sensibilities greater expression.) Mokone preaching’s included the theme of "Africa for the Africans," (a concept first echoed by Edward Wilmot Blyden) which was later a pillar of the UNIA and ACL. The African Church united under the Ethiopian Church and briefly formed a union in 1896 with the African Methodist Church of America, which was then under the leadership of Bishop Henry McNeal Turner. This movement for Afrikan spiritual expression is the basis for the Ethiopian movement.

4 Kay, p. 33.

5 Kay, p. 34.

6 When Paul Cuffee first made his historic repatriation of free Afrikan American to Afrika, he did so as a missionary emigrant, hoping to civilized Afrikans by way of Christianity.

10 For more information on Liele and his church read, Doreen Morrison, “George Liele and the Ethiopian Baptist Church: The First Credible Baptist Missionary Witness to the World,” p. 3, http://www.bwa-baptist-heritage.org/Liele-Morrison.pdf.

11 Herbert Aptheker, A Documentary History of the Negro People in the United States (Secaucus, NJ: Citadel Press, 1973), v.1, pp. 90-93.

12 The person that raised Ethiopianism beyond its religious parameters to a post-slavery racial unity aimed at the political improvement of Afrika was Edward Wilmot Blyden (of St Thomas, Virgin Islands), who worked for the American Colonization society and was stationed in Liberia.

Quentin Tarantino’s Oscar-winning Western, Django Unchained, is one of relatively few Hollywood films depicting a Black cowboy. In reality there were many, some of whose stories were borrowed for films starring White actors. The most common image of the cowboy is a gun-toting, boot-wearing, White man – like John Wayne, or Clint Eastwood. But the Hollywood portrayal of the Wild West is a whitewashed version of the reality. It is thought that about a quarter of all cowboys were Black. Like many people, Jim Austin – a college-educated, 45-year-old businessman – hadn’t heard about the Black presence in the Old West. The discovery inspired him and his wife Gloria to set up the National Multicultural Western Heritage Museum in Fort Worth, Texas. It pays tribute to some of the forgotten Black cowboys – men like Bill Pickett, a champion rodeo rider who invented bulldogging, a technique where he would jump from a horse on to a steer and take the animal down by biting on its lip. “The kids who are learning history in our schools are not being told the truth about they way the West was,” says Austin. “I bet you nine out of 10 people in this country think that cowboys were all White – as I did.” In the real Old West, as opposed to the film depiction, Black cowboys were a common sight. “Black cowboys often had the job of breaking horses that hadn’t been ridden much,” says Mike Searles, a retired professor of history at Augusta State University. His students knew him as Cowboy Mike because he gave lectures dressed in spurs, chaps and a ten-gallon hat. “Black cowboys were also chuck wagon cooks, and they were known for being songsters – helping the cattle stay calm,” he says. Every year the North East Trail Riders recreate the rides of former slaves Searles says his research, which included poring over interviews with ex-slaves in the 1930s, suggested Black cowboys benefited from what he calls “range equality”. “As a cowboy you had to have a degree of independence,” he says. “You could not have an overseer, they had to go on horseback and they may be gone for days.” Life was, nevertheless, harder for Black cowboys than for their White counterparts. Vincent Jacobs, 80, a former rodeo rider who lives near Houston, Texas, recalls the racism he faced when he was starting out. “There would be separate rodeos for Blacks and Whites,” he says. “It was hard, real hard – they would only let me perform after all the White people had been led out of the arena.” “Being a Black cowboy was hard work,” agrees 88-year-old Cleveland Walters, who lives just outside the town of Liberty, Texas. “I hate to think of the racism I went through. When it was branding time, they’d put 20 cows in the pen and I was the one who had to catch them and hold them down. The brander was White – so in other words all the hard, dirty work was done by the Black cowboys.” Both Jacobs and Walters grew up in the 1940s, watching Westerns but never seeing any Black actors in major roles. Not only did Hollywood ignore Black cowboys, it plundered their real stories as material for some of its films. Bass Reeves was one of the first African-American lawmen The Lone Ranger, for example, is believed to have been inspired by Bass Reeves, a Black lawman who used disguises, had a Native American sidekick and went through his whole career without being shot. The 1956 John Ford film The Searchers, based on Alan Le May’s novel, was partly inspired by the exploits of Brit Johnson, a Black cowboy whose wife and children were captured by the Comanches in 1865. In the film, John Wayne plays as a Civil War veteran who spends years looking for his niece who has been abducted by Indians. In recent years, Black characters have appeared in Westerns such as Posse, Unforgiven and Django Unchained. While Hollywood is finally starting to pay tribute to the Black cowboys of yesteryear, their memory is also being honoured by the 200 members of the North Eastern Trail Riders Association, modern-day Black cowboys and cowgirls. Riding more than 100 miles in seven days on horses and in Western-style wagons, they regularly retrace the original trail rides that former slaves made. “If something is not in the popular imagination, it does not exist,” says Searles. But why did Hollywood choose to so misrepresent the true racial diversity of the West? “The American West is often considered the birthplace of America, where Americans were distinct from their European counterparts,” says Searles. “The West was where White men were able to show their courage. But if a Black man could be heroic and have all the attributes that you give to the best qualities in men, then how was it possible to treat a Black man as subservient or as a non-person?”

How can we expect Western society to develop a high culture when Western man views the world as a “rat race,” as “dog eat dog,“ or embraces ideas like “every man for himself?” These Western colloquialisms reflect the Western gestalt and have been reinforced by Western science’s canon that “man” is an animal. And if one believes he is an animal, he will act accordingly. In effect, the West has created a type of societal self-fulfilling prophecy, a pernicious cycle that consistently produces individuals whose actions and motivations encapsulate selfish, undisciplined behavior. It creates materialistic automatons, and the pool from which its leadership arises. Moreover, its leadership consists of those who have excelled in the culture’s values: individualism, competitiveness, militarism, and unscrupulous economic enterprise. Afrikans, on the other hand, possess an entirely different conception of human potential, leadership and power. Afrikan thought teaches that human character and virtue must be developed. The innate potentialities for growth exist but they must be cultivated. Mythologies address this evolved person—he is the cultural hero, the self-mastered man. Persons who achieve this developmental stage will manifest certain decora, discipline, and sense of order. Those having mastered their emotions will comprise the leadership in an Afrikan meritocracy. They exercise authority over society either directly or indirectly and live lives governed by service and self-sacrifice. This conception is totally alien to the West since it has never devised techniques or systems to create self mastered leadership. There’s nothing particularly altruistic or human centered about individualism, competitiveness, militarism, and selfish economic enterprise.

The above ideas are based on Afrikan conceptions, which were totally alien to Marx. His views on private property, class antagonism, and alienation, were concepts germane to Western culture and history but irrelevant to the majority of the world’s cultures. For Marx, similar to the Afrikan concept, the human being was malleable, but with Marx that development was not as guided and definitive as in the Afrikan case, where initiations and various rites of passage are employed. Also, his concept involved one aspect of the self apprehending the other. Thus, there still existed an antagonism within the self, and this is where Marx and Afrikan thought further diverge. Without society establishing cultural institutions that serve to guide human development, we are left with a society that through happenstance, wishes to develop human being but will instead produce overgrown children—automatons, to be exact. You cannot build a high culture with automatons. Marx believes he can build a Socialist society with automatons—it can never happen. Study Kemet and its concept of Maat, then Rome and its concept of imperium—one society was composed of human beings, the other, automatons. One society was based on communalism, the other on slavery.

Western apologists and sympathizers will introduce a Marxian class analysis to explain Western imperialist behavior, contending that the European privileged classes were the culprits and that other European social classes were also victimized. This is true; however, the same worldview and dissociated culture that created the European ruling class produced the same mentality among its masses. The difference is the masses were never afforded the opportunity or lacked the means to execute their wills, but if given the chance they would have acted identically. Thus, it is not a question of class but one of opportunity. Eventually the fruit of “overseas exploitation” benefitted the various social classes of Europe as they all experienced a rise in the standard of living and life expectancy. Europeans bare a collective responsibility and continue to this day to benefit from White supremacy.

As a footnote, if capitalism were truly the culprit, then why were the Romans, the Greeks, the Assyrians, the Aryans, and so many other non-capitalist societies, so despicable? They too were driven by a profit motive, a materialistic worldview, where self-interest is the highest human value. Why did the Soviet Union and the People’s Republic of China fail in their experiments with Marxism/Socialism? It’s not the “ism,” it’s the worldview that matters. Even with the demise of Capitalism, if the new system that replaces it is based on the same worldview, then we will be left with a "new world" that is just as contemptible as the present one.

And now it is time for my Afrocentricity to come to the forefront. From an Afrikan-centered viewpoint, Western civilization lacks culture; it does not produce human beings. By its own admission, the West views society as an amalgam of highly developed animals competing for goods and services. In terms of culture, two definitions for it exist in the West: the sum total of all societal activities, and the values and mannerisms of the ruling class. Further, there are notions like evolution, survival of the fittest, and progress that each accounts for human development and growth, but none of these approaches the Afrikan conception, which places human consciousness and the integration of the person at the center of human development. Consequently, our thinking cannot be based on Marxism, Shariah law, Judaic law, Roman law, or anyone else’s system of thought. We must return to the science of the soul, formulating cosmologies based on imagination, intuition, reason, and empirical information, and validation through not only mechanical technologies but also through the astral body (the double). The self-order must again be the basis of the world order and we must see the world order in the self. The deities, ancestors, divination, and sacrifice must be reincorporated into life’s experiences. This is our way forward. Not Marxism.

There are still many Afrikan people that are followers of the religion of Marxism. Now, I am not a Marxist, but I have a certain amount of respect for it, and like Marx, I am anti-capitalism. Karl Marx (1818-1883) was a by-product of his time. We often like to separate him from his cultural and intellectual environs, which does not allow us to truly assess his philosophic premise and historical backdrop. His thinking captured the minds of millions because it addressed exploitation, human inequity, and offered a solution rooted in activism, and not utopian intellectualism. Marx argued the universe was material in nature, with everything determined by scientific laws of matter. He denied the existence of the personal God of Judeo-Christianity and asserted there will be neither a final judgment nor an afterlife. Consciousness, he argued, does not determine social being, but social being determined consciousness, therefore, man and not God is the active, productive social being who determined his own social realities. For Marx, the human being’s real nature is discovered in the totality of his relations. However, he postulated, social relations are determined by economic activity. Thus, economic laws or economic determinism dictated the political, social, and religious realities that regulated society. Marx equally asserted that society and not God determined morality. Marx, in arguing all of the above, was dealing with concepts and themes that were current or pertinent in Western thought. Various societies, within their own cultural milieu, had already satisfactorily addressed or had avoided altogether these uniquely Western concerns. Thus, these ideas were not “universal” but primarily European concerns. According to Marx, man is alienated from himself and from Nature. In fact, a foundation of Marxist thought, is the Theory of Alienation, which posited that capitalism alienated the human being from his human essence and ultimately from his labor. Presently, the State functions under capitalism, which through industrialization and economic oppression isolates the individual and does not allow him to maximize his potential. Marx sees the development of private property (and specifically the private ownership of the means of production) and the State that formed to protect it, as the source of human alienation. Factory owners (businessmen) alienated people from their labor. Objects we produce are not our own but the “bosses.” Capital (money) reduces social relationship to common commercial denominators. Hence, capitalism perpetuates a society that is against human nature. The fulfillment of human history, according to Marx, means the elimination of and not the reformation of capitalism and the State, a change that entails the nationalization of land, factories, transport, and banks. He proposed a revolutionary political party, the Communist Party, to provide the organization and direction to achieve these ends, and move humanity to the last stage in history, communism, where alienation and oppression end, and the State withers away. Marxist’s Theory of Alienation was inapplicable to probably the vast majority of societies at the time he proposed it. His notions of labor, historical materialism (when implied progress), and private property, were all concepts that were popular in European parlances, but without foundation in many societies, especially Afrikan societies. He developed his ideas in a Eurocentric vacuum, built upon the gospel of mechanistic science, and the newly popularized theories of evolution. In his cultural arrogance, his white supremacist framework and generalizations, it never dawned on Marx that Western’s man worldview and not capitalism, was the source of his alienation. And here lies the problem, which has little to do with class, and more to do with a worldview based on dissonance and dichotomous thought. According to Diop, Europe’s devastating cold during the Ice Age resulted in food scarcity, which bred an adversarial relationship between the human being and Nature. And this is the real source of Western man’s alienation, and not the development of private property, as Marx posits. As a consequence, a materialistic, competitive, insecure, self-centered, violence-prone individual was created, who was determined to conquer and control Nature. This antagonism with Nature created a fractured sense of self, and is the incurable defect of Western civilization. The Western worldview has created a dissociated person, a disjointed being unable to see the inherent unity of life; of the harmony between humans and Nature; spirit (mind) and body; man and woman; energy and matter. All complementary relationships are viewed as opposites or as confrontational. Instead of harmony, the West sees discord. Instead of the whole, it sees the part.

A culture has an implicit worldview. Whether an individual member of a cultural group can consciously or cogently delineate his culture’s worldview, has little to do with whether that worldview exist or not. (Traditionally there are individuals within the culture that know the inner meaning and symbols of their culture and its worldview.) Once while at a meeting, I got into a discussion with a Yoruba sister. I had made a statement saying we need to re-Afrikanize ourselves to re-acculturate ourselves. She reminded me that her culture was still in tact and that she was Yoruba! A second later, she revealed she was a Christian. Not to get into a long polemic, but if you’re Yoruba but you’ve embraced the cosmogony, with an implied worldview of another culture-Judaism, which is in contradistinction to the Yoruba’s, then you have violated the Yoruba worldview, and are culturally-compromised. The Judeo-Christian tradition is based on the Bible, and I have argued in Distorted Truths, that the Bible hides a cunning anti-Afrikanism. The Bible triumphs monotheism, yet Kemet (the country that incubated Greek philosophy, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) and her people had a complex system of worship that included a Supreme Being, whose powers were departmentalize and executed through various forces, powers or systems; similar to the way that our body is one, a unit, but maintained through a series of systems, i.e., digestive, circulatory, nervous, excretory, etc. Hence, the Bible’s greatest triumph, that of monotheism, violates Afrikan thought. But, this is a superficial or puerile look at what is really happening. What is really happening, is monotheism was an attack on the matrifocal basis of Afrikan society. In Afrikan culture, the Divine was conceived as masculine and feminine, a unity. This conceptualization allowed both men and women to see the Divine in themselves, whereas monotheism, with its one male Deity, is exclusive and denies divine femininity. This would have a devastating effect of the history of women in societies that accepted monotheism. The Bible continues in its anti-Afrikanism through the punishment of Adam after he eats the forbidden fruit—he was forced to become a farmer! This may seem innocuous but this pejorative attitude towards husbandry is reinforced later in the Cain and Abel incident, where the herder kills the farmer. Why is this anti-Afrikan? Because Diop has established that farming or husbandry was the primary economic-cultural paradigm of Afrikan societies, as opposed to herding, which was the primary activity of the people that derived from the Eurasian steppes. This is all coded language that Biblical writers consciously created to establishment themselves and their way of life at the center of creation. The Bible also goes against the grain of Afrikan societies with its stress on sharing and communalism. After Cain kills Abel and God inquires about Abel, Cain retorts, “Am I my brothers’ keeper,” implying that he was not: but in Afrika—YOU ARE YOUR BROTHER’S KEEPER! We see in biblical mythology that the herder and his worldview are victorious time and time again over the farmer. What is my point—which it is impossible to adopt an anti-Afrikan worldview and believe that it has no impact on your culture, even if that view or attitude is subconscious. The best way to avoid such confusion is to return to our worldview. Hey, I trust my ancestors more than I do some European or Arab strangers bearing gifts.

Corporatocracy is an economic and political system controlled by corporate or corporate interests. It is a collective composed of corporations, banks, and governments. This collective forms a “Power Elite” composed of individuals that control the process of determining society's economic and political policies. According to economist Jeffrey Sachs, this form of government developed from four trends: 1) weak national parties and strong political representation of individual districts; 2) the large U.S. military establishment that developed after WWII; 3) big corporate money financing election campaigns, and 4) the weakening of worker's power as a result of globalization. Corporatocracy has given rise to a number of networks or complexes, which include the Military Industrial Complex (MIC), the Prison Industrial Complex (PIC), and the Political Media Complex (PMC). MIC refers to policy and monetary relationships between law-makers, the military, and armament companies. This infrastructure involves political contributions from arms companies, lobbying, military budgets and their political approval. Put more succinctly, it is a tripartite relationship between defense contractors, the Pentagon, and the government. The PIC is a network that includes corporations that contract prison labor, construction companies, surveillance technology vendors, lawyers, and lobbyists. The promotion of prison building as a job creator and the use of inmate labor are also elements of the network. This complex has led to the rapid growth of the prison population. The PMC is a complex that describes the close, systematized, symbiotic-like network of relationships between a politics, powerful individuals, and the media. It involves the collusion between governments or individual politicians and the media industry in an attempt to manipulate and obfuscate information rather than inform the people. There is also recent evidence that suggest more recent media portals more readily use the PMC framework.

Starting with the 911 attack, which many argue was an inside job, employing two of the three complexes, the MIC and the PMC, the government passed the Patriot Act, which broadly defined terrorism. The Act greatly expanded the power of government to conduct secret searches of private homes, permitted the attorney general to detain aliens as security threats whenever he wanted, stipulated new rules enabling government to demand records of any person’s book purchases or borrowings from bookstores and libraries, and increased the government’s surveillance authority in many other ways. For example, the government has expanded both surveillance of private individuals and the collection of data about them. It has detained many American citizens, indefinitely, and without charge or access to a lawyer. It threatens to execute some of these detainees after trials before a special military tribunal where traditional safeguards to protect the “innocent until proven guilty” principle will not be applicable. Many of these policies that began during the Bush administration and have continued unabated under Obama, are unconstitutional or illegal under international law and they clearly violate civil liberties.

When you combine the growth of the various complexes and their effect on the democratic process, along with the political restrictions on civil liberties as a result of the War on Terror, it would seem that America is truly moving towards a fascist system. As early as 1936, Daniel Guerin in his Fascism and Big Business, spoke about growing interrelationship between government and industry. He defined Fascism as "an informal and changing coalition of groups with vested psychological, moral, and material interests in the continuous development and maintenance of high levels of weaponry, in preservation of colonial markets and in military-strategic conceptions of internal affairs." Although all aspects of a fascist regimes does not apply to the present state of the U.S. Corporatocracy, there are a number of features that people should be concern if not alarmed by. As a school teacher, I taught that Fascism was characterized by four tendencies: extreme nationalism, militarism, anti-communism, and state-sponsored capitalism. Through notions of American exceptionalism, “Tea-partyism,” the continued phobia towards Socialism/Communism, the various complexes and networks that work against democracy and governmental transparency, the Patriot Act, and the growth of the U.S. corporate state, America has embrace all of the basic elements of Fascism. More specifically, we can see American fascism in 1) the Corporative organization of the economy that suppresses unions, broadens the sphere of state intervention (as in the case of abortion rights), and the collaboration of the private sectors with the government the various complexes), while at the same time preserving private property and class divisions, and 2) a foreign policy inspired by the lure of national power and American exceptionalism jargon, with the goal of imperialist expansion (as in the case of the recolonization of Afrika). You can call it corporatism, neo-fascism or fascism, but in the end it is what it is!

I think it is time to call a spade a spade, to point out that there is an elephant in the room; and that that 800-pound gorilla in the room is not your uncle or relative. Our issues with hair texture and skin color reflect deep psychological wounds. There is presently a natural hair movement happening in the U.S. and I have attended several “meet-ups,” as these gatherings are called. Many of the women present at these meet-ups take the position that them wearing their hair natural has nothing to do with racial pride or that they are not making a political statement—it's just a matter of style. This may be partly true but only on a conscious level, for given the history of discrimination and negative attitudes because of one having a highly curled or coiled texture, it is impossible for the wearing of natural hair to not touch on psychological if not psychical dimensions, whether subconsciously or even “unconsciously.” At one time in the Afrikan diaspora, especially the U.S., men and women would straighten their hair and lighten there skin. Skin lightening has fallen out of favor in most of the diaspora but it has recently been marketed to the continent, where its use is growing at alarming rates. But our attitude towards our hair has remained consistent. That is until the appearance of the natural hair movement. (However, even within the natural hair movement, one can still see the “good hair” phenomenon lingering about, the better the curl definition, the “gooder” the hair.) To say that wearing natural hair does not make a statement, is to be naïve. Since the rise of Semitics and Caucasian power, Afrikan women, whose beauty has been questioned or denied, in large part because of their hair, to now wear that which has been historically ridiculed as unattractive or even subhuman, and to see beauty in it, to style it in the most amazing, and creative ways, is not simply a question of personal or individual style—it is a racial statement that addresses and redefines what is beautiful. It is a major pronouncement. You belittle the statement when you reduce it to the personal or even egotistical. No, natural hair is bigger than the individual, it always has been. It a racial thing whether you own up to it or not. So, if wearing your hair natural is no big thing, then you need to make it a big thing; if not for yourself then for all the little girls you will inspire and send the message that you are beautiful, hair and all, just as you are. Once we can do this, then this natural hair trend will truly become a movement, and once it becomes a geniuine movement, we can transform it into a revolution!PS: IndiaArie was correct in that the spirit is the essence of our being. But she sort of sidetracked the importance of our self image of ourselves as human beings living under the material circumstances that we do.

In the tradition of Queen Nzingha a Mbande and Queen Mother Yaa Asantewa

Araminta Harriet Ross

Born Araminta Harriet Ross, in 1820, Harriet Tubman was a fugitive slave, one that never compensated her owner; she was an “acting abolitionist” as opposed to a “talking abolitionist,” a distinction John Brown often made; she was a humanitarian; and Union spy during the U.S. Civil War. Tubman was beaten by the various masters to whom she was hired out to and would suffered a severe head wound after being accidentally hit by a two pound metal weight on the head. The injury caused disabling seizures, narcoleptic attacks, headaches, and powerful visionary and dream experiences, which occurred throughout her life. Harriet, who was told as a child she was of Ashanti lineage, was a god-fearing, unassuming woman. We must assume her interpretation of Christianity was a blend of the earlier Afrikan spiritual survivals and the little understanding she derived from her mother telling her biblical stories. Clearly, Harriet rejected white interpretations of scripture that urged slaves to be obedient and found guidance in the Old Testament tales of deliverance. She would ascribed the visions and vivid dreams she experienced as a result of the blow to revelations from God. Using the network of antislavery activists and safe houses, composed of free and enslaved blacks, white abolitionists, and other activists, known as the Underground Railroad, Harriet escaped at the age of 29. She traveled by night, guided by the North Star, trying to avoid slave catchers, who were eager to collect rewards for fugitive slaves. The "conductors" in the Underground Railroad used a variety of deceptions for protection. For example, at one of the earliest stops, the lady of the house might ordered Tubman to sweep the yard to make it appear as if she was a slave for that family. Once night fell, the family hid her in a cart and took her to the next “station.” These “routes” were used by other fugitive slave, therefore secrecy was of utmost importance, and Harriet did not speak about them until later in her life.

She crossed into Pennsylvania with a feeling of relief and awe, and recalled the experience years later: "When I found I had crossed that line, I looked at my hands to see if I was the same person. There was such a glory over everything; the sun came like gold through the trees, and over the fields, and I felt like I was in Heaven." Soon after Harriet reached Philadelphia, she began thinking of her family. "I was a stranger in a strange land," she said later. "[M]y father, my mother, my brothers, and sisters, and friends were [in Maryland]. But I was free, and they should be free." She began to work odd jobs and save money. Then she met William Still, the son of manumitted slaves. Still, born in freedom, began his career as a clerk working for the Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society. When Philadelphia abolitionists organized a committee to aid fugitive slaves who reached Philadelphia, Still became its chairman. By the 1850s, Still was a leader of Philadelphia's African-American community. One of the main reasons we know of Harriet Tubman is because of the work of Still. Often called "The Father of the Underground Railroad," Still was responsible for helping as many as 800 slaves escape to freedom through his network, interviewing each person and keeping careful records, including a brief biography and the destination of each person, along with any alias that they adopted, though he kept his records carefully hidden. Still worked with other Underground Railroad agents operating in the south and in many counties in southern Pennsylvania. His network to freedom also included agents in New Jersey, New York, New England and Canada. Harriet Tubman was part of his network and after the Civil War, Still published the secret notes he’d kept in diaries during those years, in his book entitled, The Underground Railroad. The book is a source of many historical details of the workings of the Underground Railroad, and includes Tubman's exploits, as well as others. Still realized Harriet longed for her love ones, and that she wanted them to enjoy freedom too. He enlisted Harriet's services to be a conductor on his network of the Underground Railroad. The rest is history: She would return more than thirteen times to rescue more than 70 slaves (for this feat alone, abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison named Harriet, “Moses”); she helped John Brown recruit men for his raid on Harpers Ferry; worked for the Union Army, first as a cook and nurse, and then as an armed scout and spy; was the first woman to lead an armed expedition in the war, guiding the Combahee River Raid, which liberated more than 700 slaves in South Carolina; she became active in the women's suffrage movement after the war; and near the end of her life, she lived in a home for elderly African Americans that she had helped found years earlier. What an incredibly amazing life!!! And one of the most amazing things about her life is that she lived to tell about it. She died at the age of 93. Damn! Harriet Tubman, my hero (or sheroe, if you like).

Father Jailed For Life Without Parole After His 12 Week-Old Daughter Died After Receiving 8 Vaccinations!

Mr. John Sanders and his 12 week-old baby daughter, Ja’Nayjah

On January 15, 2014, Mr. John Sanders was sentenced to life in prison without parole for the murder of his 12 week-old baby daughter, Ja’Nayjah, who died just 24 days after receiving eight vaccinations in one day.

Ja’Nayjah Sanders was born a healthy, normal baby and received routine vaccinations, along with her mother, Marrie, before leaving the hospital. Two days later, at a routine checkup, the doctor told Marrie that her daughter had lost a couple of pounds since her birth and asked her to bring the baby back the next day for tests.

However, believing that her daughter was fine, Marrie decided to ignore the doctor’s advice and wait until her next scheduled appointment, when Ja’Nayjah was scheduled to receive her routine vaccinations.

A Tragic Vaccine InjuryThis is a decision Marrie now bitterly regrets, because shortly before her appointment was due, Ja’Nayjah’s health began to deteriorate and she began vomiting continuously. As Marrie was worried about her daughter’s condition, she mentioned this to the doctor at the baby’s appointment.

However, the doctor appeared unconcerned and told Marrie that Ja’Nayjah was probably ‘eating too much.’ Instead of checking the baby over thoroughly, as one would expect, the doctor proceeded to ignore the warning signs that something could be very wrong regarding the health of this child and instead vaccinated the sick baby with the eight vaccinations listed on her vaccination card. These were the triple vaccine, the DTaP; polio; Rotavirus; hepatitis B, meningitis; and the Hib vaccination.

Marrie told VacTruth:

“After Ja’Nayjah came home from receiving her shots, she just wasn’t the same baby anymore. Before, she was this cheerful, happy baby, but after, she just changed and wasn’t as bright and cheerful as she once was. She started wheezing, was congested and was still throwing up. And when she cried, she would scream an unusual scream, almost as [if] she [were] screaming in pain. After her shots, her dad bought some infant Tylenol, which I would give her twice a day.”

However, once again, Marrie decided that she would not bother the doctor because he had told her that babies often become unwell after vaccinations.

This is a myth told to mothers on a daily basis regarding vaccinations, and in my opinion, could not be further from the truth. It stands to reason that if vaccinations were good for a child’s health, they would not cause a healthy baby to become feverish, develop rashes and have fits.

Due to a recent separation from her partner, Marrie decided to visit John with Ja’Nayjah a few weeks later.

Marrie picks up the story:

“The night before we went to see John, Ja’Nayjah was very fussy and was acting irritated. I eventually fed her a bottle and she went to sleep. I woke up the next morning, left Ja’Nayjah, and left her with John. Within an hour of me leaving, I received a text message from John saying the baby stopped breathing and that he was at the hospital. I called him and he told me that she woke up screaming, and when he was in the kitchen making her a bottle, she stopped screaming, and when he returned, she was unresponsive.

When I made it to the hospital, she was unconscious, and after about a hour of being there, we had to be transported to a different hospital where she had the CT Scan and the doctor told me that she looked as if she had been shaken because of the bleeding on her brain. I phoned John, asked him why he shook my baby, and he said that he didn’t.

While at the hospital, she had to have emergency brain surgery and blood transfusions. She died in my arms after spending about 12 hours in the hospital.”

Marrie says that she absolutely believes that John did not shake Ja’Nayjah and that her daughter only became ill after receiving her routine vaccinations. However, despite this fact, John was immediately arrested for killing 12 week-old Ja’Nayjah.

He has since been jailed for life without parole for her murder.

What Did Kill Baby Ja’Nayjah? So, was John responsible for Ja’Nayjah’s death, or did she suffer a severe adverse reaction to the vaccinations, as suspected by her mother?

Reading through the autopsy report, I noticed it was full of inaccuracies and raises many unanswered questions. On page 1, it states:

“Ja’Nayjah Sanders, a 3 month old female infant, reportedly presented to McLaren Health Center in cardiopulmonary arrest. Following resuscitation, she was transferred to Sparrow Hospital. A CT Scan demonstrated subdural hemorrhaging. During a craniotomy, the brain was noted to be nonpulsatile. Complications of the brain injury with hypoxia developed, including disseminated intravascular coagulation, metabolic acidosis and pneumonia. The child died while hospitalized. The admission to the hospital occurred on 01.04.2013. The baby was pronounced dead at 22.30 hours.

Reportedly, Ja’Nayjah had not been sick in the recent past and had not taken any medications. There were no known birth defects and the child received appropriate well visits. There was no exposure to ill persons or pets in the recent past and the baby did not attend daycare. The mother began prenatal care at 8 weeks of pregnancy. The baby had no health issues when born and the delivery was vaginal. The child was full term. The baby was formula fed with Enfamil. The child reportedly was normal, happy and playful 24 hours before becoming unresponsive. The body temperature at the hospital was 96 degrees. Between 8 o’clock and 9 a.m. on the date of the death, the father reports going to get a bottle for the baby and that while he was filling it, the baby stopped crying so he went over to check why. At that point, he found the baby unresponsive and not breathing. The father of Ja’Nayjah called his uncle; his uncle came over in a car, picked up Mr. Sanders and the baby and drove them to McLaren Hospital in Lansing, Michigan.” (own emphasis)

The coroner’s report certainly does not tie up with what the mother says.

It is clear that this little girl had been ill on both occasions that she had been seen by her doctor. Despite this fact, the doctor failed to examine Ja’Nayjah and had continued to vaccinate her even though she was clearly a sick child.

Interestingly, the autopsy also states:

“Gastrointestinal system: Representative sections obtained from the small and large intestines are free of significant histopathological abnormalities. The very superficial mucosa of the stomach displays early hemorrhage.”

This could mean that this baby had been suffering from some degree of gastritis, which would have accounted for the baby’s continual vomiting and subsequent bleeding in the stomach. [1]

The coroner also reported that Ja’Nayjah’s lungs were congested. This would be in line with Marrie’s report of ‘wheezing and congestion’ observed after her eight vaccinations.

A Different Child’s Name Appears On The Scans The autopsy report is not the only report to raise serious questions about the way the evidence was gathered and presented to the court. It has since emerged that several of the scans used as evidence to convict Mr. Sanders appear to have a different child’s name on altogether!!! How is this possible?

Are the scans belonging to Ja’Nayjah in another child’s file?

This is gross medical negligence on the part of the hospital and raises many concerns about how this case was prepared for trial.

Did Ja’Nayjah Have An Underlying Medical Condition? Baby Ja’Nayjah died just 24 days after receiving eight vaccinations in one day.

Is it possible that Ja’Nayjah was suffering from a vitamin C deficiency? This condition is often brought on by receiving multiple vaccinations.

In 2006, Dr. Michael Innis wrote a paper published in the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons, titled Vaccines, Apparent Life-Threatening Events, Barlow’s Disease, and Questions about Shaken Baby Syndrome, in which he discussed whether or not the unexplained bruising, subdural hemorrhages, and retinal hemorrhages currently being diagnosed as shaken baby syndrome (SBS) is caused not by parents viciously shaking their children, but rather a vitamin C deficiency brought on by multiple vaccines. [2]

His paper discussed two separate cases of babies who became ill shortly after multiple vaccinations. Both children were found to have suffered fractures and bleeds to the brain.

In his discussion, Dr. Innis stated that:

“As far as we are aware, no one has measured the blood levels of vitamin C or histamine in cases of suspected SBS. The possible existence of vitamin C deficiency is therefore hypothesized from clinical, radiological, and other laboratory findings. There are several features, common to both cases, that predispose to or are consistent with a diagnosis of vitamin C deficiency:

1. The mothers had documented nutritional problems and were unwell during their pregnancies.

2. The mothers smoked during their pregnancies, thereby lowering their own and their infants’ vitamin C levels.

3. Both infants were being formula-fed at the time of their illnesses, and the mothers were not advised to give supplemental vitamin C.

4. Both parents reported early evidence consistent with Barlow’s disease: spontaneous bruising in one infant and delayed wound healing in the other.

5. Both infants had deficiencies in essential and nonessential amino acids necessary for the production of normal collagen, which is essential to prevent scurvy.

6. Both infants had evidence of liver dysfunction.

7. Unexplained fractures were recorded in both children.

In addition to the low amino acid levels, the second infant had additional evidence of malnutrition in that the serum albumin, calcium, and hemoglobin levels were all low.

Animal experiments have demonstrated that administration of vitamin C can counter some of the ill effects of nicotine in newborns. This suggests that mothers who smoke may compromise vitamin C levels in their children.”

Dr. Innis has now studied all the paperwork in Ja’Nayjah’s case and he has confirmed that this child had an underlying illness and that vaccinations could have led to her death. An appeal will be launched to release her father from life in prison.

More Evidence Supports The Dangers Of Multiple Vaccinations It appears that Dr. Innis’s work and research is in line with a paper written by the late Dr. Archie Kalokerinos, M.D., titled Shaken Babies in a section titled The Role Played by Vaccine Administration. He stated:

“I would like to avoid this subject but cannot do so.

It is not a matter of whether vaccines should or should not be used.

It is a matter of – ‘Is there a role for vaccines in the pathogenesis of the Shaken Baby Syndrome?

In several cases (probably a significant number) the final collapse followed within a very short period of a vaccine administration. In the Sally Clark case, this happened with her two babies. She refused to have her third baby (born after she was charged) vaccinated.

There is no doubt, in my mind (and this is based on long experience) that despite advice to the contrary it is not wise to administer vaccines to sick infants—including infants with‘colds.’ This is because, with infections (including ‘colds’), endotoxin is likely to be produced in the gut in excessive amounts, and liver detoxification processes are likely to be stressed.

Immediately, some practitioners are going to state that in many situations some infants ‘always have colds.’ This applies particularly to groups such as Australian Aborigines. The answer to that is to supplement, first, with vitamin C and zinc. Risks will then be reduced enormously (but not completely).

Mechanisms involved with vaccine administration include excessive endotoxin formation. Knowing this allows one to follow the remainder of the pathway towards the development of the pathologies found in so-called ‘shaken babies.’” (emphasis added)

He concluded that:

“I have no doubt that this ‘shaken baby’ business will eventually be recorded as one of the worst pages in the history of pediatrics. And the saddest part of it all concerns the fact that, while important doctors are busy collecting ‘evidence’ for the prosecution, vital issues that can save many lives are being not only ignored but destroyed with intense hostility.”(emphasis added) [3]

This is an excellent paper in which Dr. Kalokerinos made his view abundantly clear, especially in the sections that I have emphasized.

Conclusion Despite Marrie’s obvious concerns that her daughter may have suffered from possible vaccine injuries, vaccines were the last things on anyone’s mind when it came to charging and sentencing Mr. Sanders. In fact, absolutely no expert witnesses from any field of medicine was asked to give evidence in Mr. Sanders’ defense. This case was completely one-sided, hinging on weak, flimsy evidence, all of which was completely circumstantial.

The only way that this prosecution team could know for sure that Mr. Sanders shook his baby daughter to death would have been video evidence or a credible eyewitness account. Since there was no video evidence and no eyewitness account, the prosecution’s account and ‘evidence’ should be counted as nothing more than conjecture and hearsay.

Yet again, this case proves that other possible causes for this child’s ill health, including vaccine injuries, were ignored in favor of blame. Mr. John Sanders should be released immediately and then sue this hospital for medical incompetence, medical malpractice and false imprisonment.

Law governs the Afrikan universe (personified as the neter Maat in Kemet) giving order and meaning to everything; and everything has it proper place, role, and protocol in Nature, including that domain within Nature where humans have carved out their existence, culture. And it is with this mindset that we must approach the issue of homosexuality in Afrika. Ultimately, Afrikan cultures produced a society that championed man-woman, husband-wife relationship as a microcosm of the relationship between the Creator and his wife the Earth. Living in a divinely structured universe, in which even space and time reciprocated as masculine and feminine energies, mitigated against developing arbitrary personal ideologies, or philosophies about existence. Cultural practices and cosmological ideals support each other, helping to create a wholistic harmonious society that sought to integrate every aspect of life. It is only when Afrikan cultures fail to live according to cosmology, when traditional institutions breakdown, that societies become subject to countless anomalies, homosexuality being just one. Kenya is an example of how foreign influences, especially “modernization,” adversely effect traditional societies. The ethnic distribution of Kenya’s estimated population of over thirty million people in 2000 was 22 percent Kikuyu; 14 percent Luhya; 13 percent Luo; 12 percent Kalenjin; 11 percent Kamba; 6 percent Kisii; 6 percent Meru; and the rest divided among European, Asians, and Arabs.6 A political remnant of Western imperialism, Kenya, like other Afrikan societies is multiethnic, multilinguistic, and religiously diverse. What the noted Kenyan scholar Ali Mazrui has called the “triple heritage,” traditional society (with its worldview, cosmology, and rituals), Islam (with its worldview, secularization and dichotomization of society), and Westernization (with its modernity, consumerism, Christianity and Marxism), has impacted upon society in every way, mixing traditional values and imposing alien ones. Depending on the level of urbanization, intergroup marriages, religion, and the amount of Western education a Kenyan is exposed to, will determine his degree of cultural dissociation and fragmentation. In the West, religious or spiritual values are personal and private, while in Afrika they are communal and social. Even sexual behavior is a communal activity, important primarily in the context of childbearing and maintaining the lineage group. Although sharing essentially the same worldview, different Afrikan cultures in Kenya maintain different sexual values and customs. For example, among the Luo, a woman is disgraced if she gives birth before marriage, while a few groups view it is as a valuable sign of fertility. Among the Somali, Maragoli, and Luo female virginity is highly value, while it is viewed differently among the Kisii, Kikuyu, and Nandi. With the Kikuyu an impotent man may provide a partner for his wife; the same is true of Kisii culture, where a man if impotent can provide an omosoi nyomba, meaning “warmer of the house” for his wife; among the Nandi, a married woman can continue to have sex with any member of her husband’s age set; Masai women and men are considered husbands and wives to their entire age group and can have intercourse with any “spouse” they choose. In contrast, the Maragoli consider extramarital sex as adultery and subject to fines. Thus, excluding Islamic and Western sexual mores and influences, Afrikans in urban settings experience “culture shock” just between themselves. Now imagine the complexity of the relationship when a Luo Muslim man marries a Western educated Christian Kikuyu woman. Traditional society expects parents to refrain from discussing sexual matters with their children. Nevertheless, children learn about sex from older children and through “sex play” with their peers. Adults maintain a “liberal” attitude in regard to sex play among children or the uncircumcised, though it is still subject to customary rules. Because puberty rites address social puberty rather than biological puberty, several years may lapse before a boy who has actually reached puberty undergoes the rite. In such cases, these young men “secretly” engage in sexual activities. However, even these “secret” trysts follow customs. For example, the Kikuyu tacitly understand these couples are not to engage in intercourse, though they allow petting and breast fondling. Maragoli girls frequently engage in “sex play” with boys but only after puberty can they engage in intercourse. The Kisii allow extensive sex play among smaller children, but such activities are to be kept away from one’s parents. The Luo allow uncircumcised boys to engage in interfemoral or “thigh” intercourse. A prepubescent Nandi boy rarely has the opportunity for intercourse due to the strict controls of the warrior age set. And in the few cases where customs permit premarital intercourse, pregnancy is avoided using the withdrawal method. Puberty initiation is the time when society teaches youth “sex education” and gender roles that are appropriate for society. No longer considered a child, the young adult must abandon sexual behaviors associated with childhood, thus, if adult males engage in self-pleasuring it is considered childish and immature. In addition to the shame, the circumcised man who continues such behavior is considered unfit for adult responsibilities.This brings me back to a point I made earlier. In the West, scientist and theorist devise theorems about sexuality. In Afrika, however, the natural course of human life becomes the textbook on sexuality. And culture must provide structure for it. For example, Kinsey developed a scale of sexuality, somewhat arbitrarily, which scanned from heterosexual exclusivity to homosexual exclusivity. But in Afrika, we see sexual behavior is age-determined. It moves from childhood which is autosexuality (which often includes mutual sex pleasuring, with some behaviors being “bisexual”) to adulthood heterosexuality to elderhood asexuality. This movement is not based on a philosophy, but the understanding that human grow and change, and that one size does not fit all. Human sexuality is based on the experience of human being that has been pass down for generation; it is based on a tradition of wisdom and not simply theoretical science. And most of all it is design to let human experience what humans will experience while providing a structure that will maintain order and smooth transitions from one stage of life into the next.Reference:

Norbert Brockman, “Jamhuri ya Kenya” http://www2.rz.hu-berlin.de/sexology/ GESUND/ARCHIV/IES/KENYA.HTM. Brockford’s work is based on Angela Molnos, Cultural Source Materials for Population Planning in East Africa (Nairobi: University of Nairobi Press, 1972-1973). There are also countless smaller Afrikan groups counted among the “rest” of the population.